Countdown
by Holly Chase
Summary: It's the final battle and everyone's there for endgame. :: A quick tribute to the seven, the prophecy and its outcome to celebrate the House of Hades release.


**The HoH comes out tomorrow! XD And this is my way of going WHOOOO! My first Percy Jackson fic that's over 8k so please drop a review on your way out. Quick warning: This is not in exact chronological order, jumping around like a tennis ball in a time-travellin tennis match. :)**

* * *

**Countdown**

Hazel clenched her fists and looked from left to right. She gritted her teeth to battle the pain that was exploding in her left shoulder. It didn't really help, but it stopped her from crying out and attracting any more attention to her weakened state. The whole 'I'm a demigod, please eat me!' sign that seemed to float, invisible except to monsters, above her head was enough to contend with.

There was a huge roar from behind her and Hazel deduced that either Frank had become some kind of raging bear or Gaia had summoned some more of her minions.

Something closed around her ankle, Hazel spun round, cavalry sword pointed to her foot.

"_Leo_," she gasped. Relief flooded through her as Leo swiped a hand across his bloodied and grimy face. There was a scar running across the right side of his face, curving down from his hairline to the jut of his chin.

Hazel knelt down, feeling the all too familiar helplessness crash down around her as she reached towards Leo. "Leo, what _happened_?"

"Gaia's army happened," Leo spoke through gnashed teeth. "I don't suppose you have any ambrosia on you?"

"Not a square," said Hazel, checking her pockets quickly.

Another roar sounded, unfriendly and blood-lusting.

Hazel decided it was time for a quick getaway.

"Can you stand?" she asked.

"Of course," snapped Leo. "And running is so much easier with this crushed ankle of mine."

"Not helping," hissed Hazel.

_Thump_…

_Thump_…

_Thump_…

"For Olympus!" a cry sounded, weak and trembling, but it was followed by an agonised cry that was definitely not human and Hazel deduced that the monster had been stabbed or possibly maimed.

Hazel hauled Leo up, he hissed in pain, clutching onto her shoulder and leaning fully on her.

"Hades, Leo," said Hazel, grunting at the coupled weight. "What have you been eating?"

Leo hopped, dragging Hazel down and glaring her full in the face. "I'm _literally_ crushed, Hazel. And all you can say is I'm fat?"

"I didn't _say_ you were fat," said Hazel.

Leo was – for once – not amused. "You implied it. Now, help please."

"I think I saw Octavian around here somewhere," muttered Hazel, letting Leo rest himself against her.

They scanned the battle ground, Hazel barely pulling trumps on her ADHD. She really wanted to fight.

"No." Said Leo, "I'm not trusting my life to that jerk-face. Just find someone less annoying."

Hazel huffed. Even when mortally wounded, Leo still insisted on trying to lower the tone and turning everything into a joke.

Hazel was about to retort that Leo would take whoever she said he would take because he was _so_ not dying on her watch when she spotted her lifeline.

"Kate!" Hazel shouted, waving frantically.

A strawberry-blonde haired girl with a blood stained arrow she was stabbing at her opponents skipped over the dissolving body of a Manticore and crouched beside Hazel and Leo.

"Yeah?"

"Take Leo," said Hazel, all but shoving Leo onto Kate's lap.

"Hey there," said Leo smiling quickly up at Kate.

Kate grimaced. "Do I have to? There's a lot of blood."

"You're a daughter of Apollo," Hazel reminded her. Kate rolled her eyes.

"Doesn't mean I have to like it."

"Deal with it," said Hazel.

"Remember me?" Leo's voice interrupted Kate as she opened her mouth to retort. "Can you girls save this argument until, oh I don't know, _AFTER THE WAR_?"

"Well you just blew our chances of getting back to camp unscathed," said Kate mildly as a hellhound the size of a tank pelted towards them.

"I'll take it," said Hazel, heaving her weighty sword into the air and charging.

The air was electric with yells and power and the clanging of sword on sword.

Blood red eyes, huge as saucers and glowing headlights in the partial darkness rose from the mass of black and the hellhound pounced. Fast as it was, Hazel was quicker, darting between lumbering paws and stabbing upwards.

Golden dust poured down on her like a huge glittering shower. Hazel stumbled, coughing from fight into fight. They were methodical and Hazel felt herself sink into the routine.

_Stab, parry, duck, uppercut, stab_… it went on and on.

And still, Hazel couldn't drag her thoughts to the battle. They kept drifting.

Were Leo and Kate safe? Had Nico made it out of that ambush? – Oh gods. Hazel swallowed, her throat suddenly too dry and her head spinning. Had he made it? Hazel didn't know.

Hazel swiped her sword across the Eurynomi she had been fighting's chest. It howled and dropped to the ground.

Hazel dodged round a large rock that she hadn't noticed before. Then, as she rested her palm against the flat of it, she recognized it was platinum – she had summoned it.

Hazel couldn't describe her sentiment. It was a mixture of happiness and regret and Hazel wondered if there was even a word for what she was feeling. _Wistful_, she realised;_ I'm feeling wistful_.

Another part of her demanded to know if she was too young to be wistful, but it was squashed as the sound of a conch echoed around the battlefield.

She didn't know what is meant.

Hazel seriously doubted it meant anything good.

* * *

There was a rustle in the air.

Thalia raised her hand in a fist and turned her head southwards.

There was a shout, followed by a long, hollow scream. It reverberated around the camp like a warning and long after the noise faded out, there was stillness.

"What do we do?" asked Samantha, an auburn haired dryad.

Phoebe tapped Thalia on the shoulder: "Thalia?"

Thalia turned to face the Huntresses, they wore their silver parkas zipped up to their chins and wolves curled around their legs, silvery in the moonlight.

"It's time to take our stand," said Thalia slowly.

* * *

It was difficult for Frank to concentrate on changing into useful creatures because of the fighting. Not just background fighting where a few people were sparring for fun and occasionally drawing blood because having dessert rights taken away for a night in exchange for maiming some annoying person was something everyone had done at some point.

And if they said they hadn't, they were lying.

Anyway, Frank would have been totally fine with that sort of fighting but when a full on battle fleet was swarming around you and the ground attempted to pull you down into its muddy core where Gaia would be waiting. And the monsters didn't just avoid Frank or sit back and think 'oh there's a kid having a bit of a problem controlling his powers that would no doubt have us beat, let's wait and give him a fair chance'.

Monsters were stupid, but not _that_ stupid.

Claw began to snap into Frank's fingers, he dropped his bow and arrows quickly and gutted a Manticore that had been sneaking up on him before launching into a claw to club fight with a 'small' giant.

Small in relation to other giants though, so still over ten foot tall.

He was ugly, Frank decided, with his potato shaped head and bobbly cheeks as though someone had stuck them in a furnace and his nose like a huge mushroom jutted at an odd angle, clashing with his wiener mouth. Why was he comparing everything to food again? Oh yeah, he was hungry. Frank's stomach growled.

Drawn back suddenly into the fight as the giant thumbed his wooden club down about an inch from where Frank had been standing.

Frank looked down and saw the earth fly away from his feet. He looked up, heat thumping in his throat, ready to claw but her stopped when a familiar face stared back at him.

"Ella!" he gasped.

"Ella has come to join the fight," squawked the harpy, flapping her wings with another powerful beat. "Fight; adjective: a battle or combat. Wikipedia. Ella saved friend. Saved; rescued, liberated, let go…"

"Please don't let go," said Frank.

Ella stopped flying upwards and held Frank aloft in the air where they surveyed the battle scene. It was a vomit inducing sight with fallen demigods clearly visible, contrasting against the piles of golden dust with their bloodied bodies.

Frank desperately tried to focus on the battles but his eyes kept being drawn to the piles of figures, some wearing purple and other in orange and every time Frank saw another person getting chucked onto the corpse pit it felt as though he was getting stabbed in the gut and thousands of questions whirled through his head.

The feeling of helpless anger rose inside of him and before he knew it, Frank had imploded outwards, throwing his body wide. Ella gave a squawk of shock and let go, soaring high.

Frank thrust his powerful wings upwards in huge deafening beats. He felt the wind rise and fall beneath him, currents restless and cool against his scaled cheeks. Something was burning in the pit of his stomach, like acid but growing hotter and hotter.

Frank dived down in a streamline and roared, from his mouth came a Jetstream of fire, red and gold. There were cries of pain, no human as far as he could make out.

Then he pelted upwards again, Hazel's scared and scarred face burning his vision more painfully than any wound he had received.

* * *

"PIPER!" shouted Jason desperately.

He stabbed and wacked a aurali around the head with his shield. "PIPER! WHERE ARE YOU?"

* * *

_And with blood stained hands,_

_They will kill each other for you,_

_Death's your legacy._

Will stared at the poem in his hands, brushing away tears hastily as someone forced their way into the healer's tent.

"I want to fight, Chiron," he said and turned around to face Chris.

The son of Hermes took a step back, wacked Will on the shoulder and grabbed a pack of ambrosia from the makeshift desk table/rock. "Nice try, Will, but we need you here. Keeping people safe and healing them."

"Last time there was a war, I was allowed to fight," grumbled Will, shrugging away.

"Well, last time there was a war we had no other choice. It was all or nothing man," Chris's eyes shone with sympathy, Will looked away. He didn't want any pity. "This time we have the Romans on our side, you children of Apollo need to stay safe so everyone else doesn't _die_."

"Would you?" asked Will, squaring his shoulders.

"What?"

"If you were told that you weren't allowed to fight, would you?"

"No," snapped Chris. "I wouldn't because I would know that it was my duty and in a battle everyone must stick to their jobs."

"Yeah right," Will rolled his eyes. Chris slammed him into the jagged edge of the rock face behind them.

"Yeah. Right." He was breathing heavily as he snarled in Will's face. "Now get back to work."

He grabbed his sword from his belt and shoved back onto the battle field. As the wards were lifted, for a second the sound of screaming and yelling and retching and clanging was suddenly and deafeningly clear.

_Ten…_

_Nine…_

Will reached for his bow and shafts.

_Six…_

_Five…_

_Four…_

_Three, two, one…_

Then he strode out through the curtain and leapt into battle, a spray of blood, rank and acidic splattered over him.

* * *

Piper was lost.

She circled eyes wide and Katoptris drawn.

Monsters ran past her, blurry and unseeing.

"_Piper_," hissed a voice. Goosebumps prickled along Piper's arms and the hair on the back of her neck stood on end.

She recognised that voice.

That icy, icy voice.

Khione smiled that beautiful wicked smile that made Piper's blood run cold.

"Hello Piper," she drew a knife, serrated and with a gleaming ivory hilt. "As I remember, we have some unfinished business."

* * *

Leo could taste the blood in his mouth.

He could hear the ringing in his ears.

He could feel the grimy coating of blood soaking- caking- his skin.

"We need divine intervention," said Kate worriedly, looking to Lupa. The she-wolf shrugged, or, what Leo assumed was a shrug.

"Look, I'm okay," said Leo. They both threw him disparaging looks and he fell silent. He wasn't lying; they had pumped him so full of ambrosia and nectar that Leo found it amazing he wasn't a charred heap of demigod dust. And whilst it didn't fix the wound, it acted like a really strong morphine and Leo couldn't even feel the pain any more.

"I don't see how we'll be able to contact a god," Kate said.

Lupa rolled her yellow eyes: "Don't look to me, this is on you girl. Remember what I taught you."

She turned and sprang into the shadows, disappearing in a smoky flash.

"'Remember what I taught you'," mimicked Kate angrily, snapping some gauze from a roll. "All she taught me was how to fight and exploit my enemies' weaknesses."

"I'm fine," said Leo again. "Really. I can't even _feel_ my leg."

"A danger in itself," noted Kate.

"Really, Kate, come _on_!" Leo sat up and pulled his ankle away from Kate's healing fingers. "No! I need to fight. Don't you understand?"

Kate's eyes were downcast; "Give me your leg…"

"Kate!"

"Let me finish!" snapped Kate. "Now, let me gauze your injury and _then_ you can re-join the battle."

"Go, go, go!" shouted Leo. "Come on woman!"

Kate slapped him across the face. "Don't ever 'woman' me again," she warned as she began to bandage Leo's leg up.

* * *

"FOR OLYMPUS!" Clarisse stabbed and took a monster down.

"FOR ARES!" she yelled, whipping round and beheading several Eurynomi.

Her eyes glowed red with bloodlust as she charged into the fight after bloody fight.

A red aura seemed to possess her, casting her moves in all directions and weaves that she had never even seen before. It electrified her technique a turned her into the kind of killing machine that haunted monster's nightmares.

Her lips curled into a cruel smile as she swung Maimer around her head like a lasso.

* * *

Percy couldn't see anything. Completely blind, he stumbled forwards, Annabeth by his side.

The darkness seemed to press around them like a shadowy cloak, suffocating them in folds of dusty midnight.

His throat was bone dry and his hair hung about his chin like a greasy curtain, his shirt was in tatters and his shoes were soles strung to his feet by weak Velcro.

And still they kept walking forwards because it was the only hope they had left.

Annabeth gave a small sigh, almost lost in the crushing silence and Percy squeezed her arm. They were together and that was all that mattered.

* * *

Nothing could have prepared Travis for the tides of monsters that overran their makeshift barricade in a matter of seconds. Not fighting and actually purposely irritating Clarisse; not decorating the Demeter cabin with chocolate bunnies; not even the battle against the Titians.

This was a whole different ball game. Or maybe even a ball game where the ball has been chucked away completely and everyone instead tries to sabotage themselves.

"Travis!" Travis looked over his shoulder as Connor reached him, panting and red-faced – as though he wasn't even a son of Hermes.

"Are you okay?" asked Travis. Connor gulped down some bile and nodded.

"Just watched that Morpheus girl get stabbed through the head," he shuddered. "Like a kebab."

Maybe that was funny. Maybe Travis would have laughed once. He didn't.

* * *

"I don't understand," said Claymore, rubbing the back of his neck. "Alabaster you said these demigods were scum. Heck, you'd rather _die_ than fight for the gods."

"But I'm not fighting for the gods," said Alabaster. He was still staring at the spot where the IM had been.

He twisted his fingers together.

"I'm fighting for my siblings," he said.

* * *

Her ankle burnt with pain and Annabeth groaned as she was forced to duck under the failing arms of a Cyclops as it fell over backwards. Its' one eye stared up at her, accusing and incredibly dead.

Annabeth stabbed at a Manticore's open back – when had she even draw her weapon? It rested against the blade before disintegrating into golden ash.

She heard a cry and looked upwards just in time to see a huge scaled creature nosedive from the sky all red and clawed and fire breathing.

Annabeth stared for half a second and then began to run.

Her arms pumped as she increased speed.

_Faster, faster, faster. _

"RUN!" she yelled to the demigods who were too busy fighting to noticed the huge dragon bearing down on them. "RUN!"

Then her ankle gave out and she hit the ground face first.

* * *

Tyson held up his stick and thwacked something big and hairy around the head with it.

Every step or so, he would look up, searching for Ella. Something he caught sight of a whisk of red feathers but she was mostly invisible and it was all Tyson could do not to focus all his energy into following her every move.

Mrs O'Leary trotted beside him, yapping and biting monsters who got a little to close in half with no more difficulty than a chew toy. Her eyes were bright with excitement as Tyson shoved his way through a horde of demigods.

Her nose wriggled as she smelt a familiar scent. One that was good.

It smelt of sausages and fish and salt and vaguely damp and it was, to her, as obvious as it had been when they had first met even though there was something else mingling with all the good smells that made her tail wag.

It didn't smell like her master should, but more like the boy who showed up sometimes with treats and tiring but exciting journeys.

Tyson could sense it too, but he still shouted: "Percy!" at the top of his lungs and ran in for a bone crushing hug.

* * *

Reyna stood at the head of the Roman battle fleets.

She held her helmet apprehensively under one arm and she struck an imposing figure with the wind brushing her braided hair to one side and her purple and gold armour gleaming in the sun.

She didn't usually look like that before battle, but it was the plus of gaining some approval from her mother.

The Greeks were a raggedy looking lot, all standing in a huge muddle, clumped in small groups without even a battle plan.

Reyna was impressed by this, but had no desire to try the same. That was the way Greeks did things, but the Roman way was different and Reyna was proud of her troops.

The two armies representing the different halves of the gods stood side by side as Gaia's militia appeared from the crest of the hill. At their head was a Minotaur that scanned their crowds almost expectantly, but evidently did not find who he was looking for. It gave a bellow of despair and was shoved aside by a colossal giant.

It had tombstone teeth bared in a smile and eyes like hurricanes.

Reyna pulled on her helmet, tightening the strap and conducting one last quick check of her shoulder pads. She felt her people behind her do the same.

Then Reyna cast her eyes skywards, resisting the urge to shield her eyes from the sun. The opposing army would not be able to see her eyes and it was vital that they did not know of their plan.

"Come out, come out," boomed the giant. "Seven, come and face your fate. Don't hide behind your comrades; cowardice will only result in the assured massacre of everyone you hold dear. Which would be – I'm sure," he smirked, "a tragic loss for both of us."

Biting her tongue, Reyna forced herself not to rise to the bait and willed everyone to remain silent. Evidently her prayers were heard as no one gave a peep.

"I see," the giant sounded disappointed. "Well, I'm afraid that means-"

But what it meant they never found out although Reyna serious doubted the sentence ended '- we must all sing sea shanties around a camp fire' (not that Reyna would do that anyway) because at that moment Reyna spotted Jason.

His purple shirt flapping in the winds, and sword raised and glinting blindingly in the fading sunlight like a beacon of flames, he had never looked more impressive and Reyna had never felt as though she knew him less.

Reyna raised her sword, feeling the power of the two armies swell behind her.

"For Olympus!" she shouted and then they took off, the Romans in a tough formation and the Greeks running any which way at Gaia's troops.

And so the bloodbath began.

* * *

Octavian smiled, staring at his half reflection in his gold-tipped arrow.

Then he notched his bow and fired.

* * *

"_Προστασία_," murmured Lou Ellen, setting her feet a shoulder width apart and holding her hand up, palms first. Already the strain of the spell was wearing at her, grating at her mind and strength.

Even with her siblings help, Lou Ellen still took the brunt of the load because she was the eldest and the only one who knew exactly how the spell worked and they couldn't allow it to fail.

Not now.

"Just hold out for a few more minutes," she prayed: "Just a little while longer."

But the protective enchantment was already slipping from her fingertips, like sand through a timer and she couldn't hold it up and more. She sank to her knees in her efforts to keep the spell from breaking.

And then suddenly the weight was lifted from her shoulders, Lou Ellen looked up in surprised and was met by a familiar figure with bright green eyes.

"Hello, Lou," said Alabaster with a smile, holding his palms, already stained with the purple runes of protection towards the shield. "I got your IM."

* * *

Katie commanded plants to grow in huge web-like structures and traps and hangings, each with the sole purpose to kill Gaia's monsters.

Still, as she pulled the long-rifled, ivory handled gun from her pocket she wished that she believed it would be enough.

There was a click as she notched the revolver, clutching the trigger between shaking fingers, she had never even touched a gun before and now she was expected to shoot down her opponents.

She took a trembling, shivering breath and her scared looking reflection in the barrel, wispy hair and crooked armour with straps that didn't quite fit her body contours. Too stiff and straight jacked for Katie to move well, swamped as she was by the metal breast-plate.

Stretching left, she reached for Miranda's hand. It was cold. Katie squeezed it tighter. Another hand reached for hers and Katie knew who it was without even having to look. Their fingers twisted together and Katie prayed that everything would be okay.

* * *

Jason couldn't remember a time he had felt more powerful. He watched demigod and monster and mortal alike sink to the muddy, bloodied ground and he was still alive with the adrenalin pumping through his veins like caffeine.

His heart bashed against his ribcage with the kind of force often associated with drums, timpani's with long echoing blows and a firm jerk at the end of each beat.

With each beat it felt as though his blood was singing to the tune of the battle cries being screamed all over the place, rising moral and all-round just annoying Gaia's militia.

ADHD was a godsend, Jason decided as he realised he had just unconsciously dodged a blow with a scythe that would have undoubtedly beheaded him. Literally.

From the corner of his eye Jason noticed a Greek demigod with dark hair and bright green eyes fall.

"Percy!" he shouted, half in delight, half in absolute shock. When had the son of Poseidon escaped? And did that mean Annabeth was around too? – Because if she was Jason needed to have a quick discussion concerning automans. Or more specifically the correct way to blow them. If there even _was_ a correct way.

Percy looked up, his face split into a grin as he started to his feet. Stabbing a Manticore from his path, Jason began to run towards Percy. He took out a Hellhound and something that looked like a huge stick insect as he pumped his arms.

And then Percy's eyes widened. He fell forwards again, slack against the grass.

Jason watched as an axe was dislodged from between Percy's shoulder blades, mouth agape in impossible horror.

Because Percy Jackson couldn't be dead. The hero of Olympus could not be defeated by a simple axe and a second rate monster.

It wasn't possible.

And yet Percy didn't move.

"And this is what will happen if you continue to fight," whispered a voice in his ear. Jason was torn between urges. To protect his own back, or to run to his friend.

He spun round.

Cold, empty eyes greeted him, coupled with an eerie smile. Gaia.

Jason gritted his teeth as Gaia's grin broadened.

She motioned to behind Jason at Percy's still body. "My pawn, don't you see?" she laughed. "You _will_ die and I _will_ rise. It's the chain of events."

Behind her there were deafening bangs and fires blasted from beneath the earth's crust.

It lit up Gaia's face as a non-existent wind kept her robes and hair blowing constantly to one side.

"Your precious earth will crumble beneath me," she said. "And I shall rule over day and night and possible and impossible. So, my pawn all this bloodshed is pointless. See?"

"Over my dead body," hissed Jason.

Gaia laughed again. "Oh, but it will be," she snapped her fingers and Jason was suddenly staring down at dead Reyna, dead Leo, dead Hazel, dead Piper, dead Frank, dead Annabeth, dead Nico, dead Dakota, dead Gwen, dead Bobby and dead Percy.

He reeled backwards and the bodies vanished. "You all really make this too easy," smiled Gaia.

* * *

Drew had never so much as held a weapon, preferring to instead rely on her resourcefulness. Especially where it came to perfumes and body glitters, they drove monsters crazy and she and her siblings got to accessorize.

Two birds with one stone, as one would say.

Apart from Drew actually like birds and didn't want to kill them at a closer range than squirting spritzes of heavy body sprays at the general body area of a particularly gruesome looking monster and standing well back as they dissolved into dust.

But Drew grabbed the hilt, uncertainly and inexpediently as her sisters argued over the cutest sword – which, of course, Drew had already pinched.

Piper tugged at her braid, biting her lip and casting her eyes uncertainly over her siblings. Drew stood up straight.

"What? Not good enough for you, Dumpster Queen?"

Piper's eyes hardened: "Perfect, thank you. And you're holding your sword all wrong."

She smirked and went to Mitchell who was struggling to tie his straps up.

Drew glared after her. Geta sidled up to her and muttered into her ear: "Not a good battle to pick, sister."

Drew glared at him as his lips curved into an easy smile.

"Shut up," said Drew, pulling out a pocket mirror and touching up her eye-liner. It was perfect as always but it relaxed her. "The _second_ this war is over, I'll get some respect out of that girl."

"I didn't think you wanted respect," grinned Geta. "Just fear of your iron fist and orthopaedic shoes."

"Isn't it the same thing?" asked Drew, absently brushing her hair back from her eyes.

* * *

Packing away her brushes, Rachel watched with a heavy heart as demigods all around her prepared for battle.

Her canvas was empty; of colour; of ideas.

"Stupid oracle vision," she muttered under her breath. "Why can't you show me things I want to know the outcome to?"

"Finally found a weakness to your 'almighty oracular power'?" asked the simpering voice of Octavian that Rachel was only too familiar with.

"Shut up and gut a teddy," said Rachel.

"Been there, done that," said Octavian, waving what looked a skinned pillow-pet in Rachel's face. "One perk of being an augur: You find what you're looking for."

"That isn't always a good thing," Rachel said with a frown.

Octavian sat down beside her. "I didn't say to make yourself at home," said Rachel, already dreading the long consequences that came with someone sitting down to speak.

"I did anyway," Octavian shrugged. "And no, it isn't always a good thing."

"… Continue," said Rachel. "What did you find?"

Octavian sat back and sighed. "An oath to keep with a final breath? Are you really that blind, oh great oracle?"

Rachel snorted. "Calling me 'oh great oracle' doesn't make me any less insulted and it also makes me sound old. And, come _on_, I speak in rhyme half the time – no pun intended – just give a straight answer for once in your stupid, self-fulfilling life!"

"People think it's easy being me," mused Octavian quietly. "Some hate me for it."

"_Some_?" laughed Rachel disbelievingly and then as Octavian shot her a look she calmed down and said in a constrained voice: "Carry on."

"You of all people should understand the weight of the future," said Octavian. "It's not easy at all."

Rachel frowned. "Octavian, what did you see?"

Octavian bit his lip and frowned, then he opened his mouth and a blaring sound that made Rachel's eardrums hurt erupted from outside the makeshift tent.

Octavian grabbed her hand, a scared look in his eyes. "We've got to be fast. It's happening."

* * *

Malcolm gulped a wiped the sweat from his forehead. He check Mitchell's armour again and then his own.

"Hey, Mal," laughed Mitchell as Malcolm's left hand jumped to his waist, checking for his sheathed sword. "You're jumpy."

"We're in the middle of a war," said Malcolm. "And I am _leading_ my cabin. _Leading_, Mitch."

"And you're doing great," Mitchell slapped Malcolm's hands away from his breast plate good naturedly. "No. Just focus on staying calm. Not on making sure I won't die a perspiring soldier."

"I'm so nervous," admitted Malcolm. "My first solo strategy, see. It's usually Annabeth's job."

"Well, Annabeth isn't here right now, and I know how much you've been sweating over this plan. It's flawless and I should know. I spent a ratio of 3:4 evenings with it."

Malcolm tilted his head to one side. "You know ratio?"

"I do now," Mitchell wrinkled his nose. "I spent a long time staring at the equation board you guys like so much. Honestly, I can't see why."

"Just cause you care more about fashion."

Mitchell crossed his arms and shot Malcolm an 'oh-you're-going-down look'. "Look at my feet," he said.

Malcolm looked down and saw Mitchell was wearing some trainers. "What?"

"I'm wearing the trainers," said Mitchell slowly. "I'm wearing the white. Orthopaedic. Trainers from Tartarus! For you."

"Um… Thanks?" Malcolm obviously had misjudged the gravity of the situation because the glare Mitchell shot him could have made Gaia herself stop dead in her tracks. Sometimes Malcolm forgot that Mitchell was just as temperamental and over reactive as all the other Aphrodite kids, maybe because Mitchell just hid it a lot better.

"I own no trainers," hissed Mitchell. "Or combat boots because they are neon signs attached to your feet shouting to the world that you will be single _forever_. You wanted me here with you, though. So I came. And I had to wear these awful trainers that somehow clash simultaneously with black and all shades of green. And don't even get me started on orange…"

"I love you," blurted Malcolm. Then he froze. What… why had he even _said_ that?

Mitchell had stopped mid-rant. Another incident that had occurred exactly once before and had involved a huge banana and a whoopee cushion. An odd expression had twisted Mitchell's face as he turned to Malcolm.

"I- I love you too," he said, his face still confused, but happy.

Malcolm smiled.

* * *

As twins, Austin and Kayla had spent most of their lives annoying the Hades out of each other.

Now, on the battle field, they spent most of their time still annoying the Hades out of each other, but defending each other's backs at the same time.

"You call that a stab?" yelled Kayla. "Ha, I've been hurt more by grapes!"

"Are you talking about the time the grape pinged off the light and somehow caused the huge chandler to fall on top of you?" wondered Austin aloud. "Because you had to have, like, seven casts after that."

"Not helping my point, airhead," snapped Kayla.

"Are you, as they say, related by blood?" asked an Amphisbaena curiously as she dodged a swing jab of Austin's celestial bronze tipped arrows.

"However did you guess?" asked Austin, sweetly as Kayla shot an automated bull.

"BULLSEYE!" she cheered, "Literally. Idiot."

She aimed a kick at Austin's shin, but he tripped her up as she swung her foot forwards.

"I can just feel the love," said the Amphisbaena before Austin brained her with his shaft.

* * *

Jake Mason had always been the handy-man.

Now he was half wondering, half trying not to think at all, what he would do if he suddenly became the handless-man. The reason he was wondering this was because he had just come extraordinarily and scarily close to losing said hands.

"Gods, Jake," said Alyssa, with a threatening swing of her mallet in his direction. "I _swear_ if you get yourself into one more life or death situation between now and next autumn, I will kill you."

"We're in the middle of a war," reminded Jake.

"That's your excuse for everything," Alyssa huffed. "We're _always_ in the middle of a war! Stop making it sound like such a big deal."

It was gift, Jake decided. Somehow, Alyssa never seemed bothered by the fact that there were more monsters than usual trying to kill them and firmly stood by her belief that if you almost got killed it was your own fault for being stupid. Jake had never actually discovered Alyssa's definition of the word 'stupid', but he slept assured by the girl herself, that it had his name in the caption.

Sometimes Jake wasn't sure whether he should be permanently flattered or scared. He settled somewhere on the fence, resting judgement for the moment and, therefore, all eternity.

He was jerked from his mental thought track as Alyssa ploughed into a Dracaena and instead of just bashing in the she monster's head, she almost seemed to rip the limbs to pieces.

She came away, hands stained gold and Jake was completely relying on his ADD reflexes to fight the monsters because his mind was reeling in a way that made thinking straight rather pointless as he stared at his half sibling.

She stifled a sort of half sob that caught in her throat before rubbing her face and turning towards another monster that she fought in a more conventional fashion. Jake forced his attention back to his own fight and demolished his opponent in seconds – a part of him was slightly ashamed a crazy centaur high on booze with runes carved his back and armed only with a tin can could have kept him busy for so long. (Triggering slight guilt as he thought of Chiron, but he quickly reminded himself that these Roman centaurs were bad news and… well, just not good.)

He wondered what secrets Alyssa was hiding and how much he actually knew about his half-sister.

Did she have a boyfriend? A family?

Jake decided if she had a boyfriend then, as her older brother, it was his duty to make a belated call on him regarding treating his 'little sis' right and how Jake would murder him if he hurt her.

If she didn't… then good.

* * *

"Hey, Gwen-Gwen," Dakota was high. Again. Still. Whatever tense they were referring to it with now.

"Hi, Dakota," she said with a smile.

He held up his hand for a high-five, which she returned, but judging by Dakota's face, not as well as and with less of the fancy tricks that; Bobby.

"Why're you 'ere, Gwen-Gwen?" asked Dakota with his usual slurred words. Gwen grimaced and prised his kool-aid bottle from his sticky-fingered grip. She would give it back to him some point. Maybe after adding a load of salt to it. Or possibly sand.

"Because there is _no way_ I'm missing out on this," said Gwen.

Dakota grinned.

"I'm glad you're here, Gwen-Gwen."

"Me too, Dakota, me too."

* * *

"As your self-appointed plant guru," Miranda stood, hands on hips.

"Do those even exist?" wondered Pollux absently.

"Can you stop peeing on my rainbow?" asked Miranda impatiently.

Pollux stepped back, hands in the air, wondering where the hell someone came up with the expression 'peeing on my rainbow' to describe their emotions. Probably, he decided, wherever Miranda spent most of her time.

"Anyway, as your self-appointed plant guru, I think you should go into battle with a rose."

"Right," Pollux studied Miranda for a long disbelieving moment. When he realised she was being completely serious he smiled at her benignly and said: "So where am I going to get one of them?"

Miranda bent to the ground and curved her hand over the muddy terrain. Then she twisted a pale pink rose from the soil where she had brought it to life and stepping closer to him, tucked it into the collar of his armour.

To Pollux's surprise, it didn't immediately begin to wilt. Daughter of Demeter thing.

"I thought you didn't approve of picking flowers," said Pollux.

"I don't," said Miranda. "But sometimes we need reminding."

"Of what?" asked Pollux.

Miranda stared at him; she was so close he could count her eyelashes. Not that he would, because that would make him a kind of stalker-y sounding person. "That we're fighting for the small things in life," she breathed, her blue eyes darting to his and then back across his face like birds, unsure where to land.

Pollux pulled back and tapped her on the nose.

"You _are_ incredibly short," he said.

* * *

She didn't run, but kind of skidded across the battle field, dodging beneath weapons and monsters.

Sometimes she couldn't help but cry out with words that were not her own.

"Run," she called half-heartedly. "Run."

No one took the slightest bit of notice of her, but they did of the blonde girl who came sprinting after her.

Echo pulled a whistle from her back pocket and studied it thoughtfully before blowing.

* * *

"Summon the guards," said Hylla. She brushed past Kinzie who had opened her door to ask whether she wanted some ambrosia.

To Kinzie's surprise, Hylla was dressed already in her armour and was twisting something on her finger – a ring – in a nervous way that Kinzie had never associated with her before.

"W- where are we going?" asked Kinzie hurrying after Hylla and taking three steps for each of Hylla's longer ones.

A silver dog trotted towards Hylla as they reached the end of the corridor. Hylla bent down and whispered into the dog's ear, then she straightened up and Kinzie watched the silver greyhound leap from a standstill so fast there was a cut out shape in the air where it had been standing only a moment before.

"That was Arum," said Hylla by means of an explanation. "My sister, Reyna's dog."

"What did it want?"

"It wanted to know whether we would stand by them," said Hylla, bursting into the training room and clapping her hands loudly.

"And will we?" asked Kinzie.

"We shall fight in the name of justice and for every woman out there," said Hylla. She paused and then thought through her sentence. "Okay, maybe not Gaia, who is actually a pretty kick-ass lady, but she's bad. So there."

"Should I paraphrase?" offered Kinzie as silence fell upon the Amazons.

"Please," Hylla shot her a grateful glance.

"Come on girls, time to kick some primordial god butt!" called Kinzie, cupping her hands around her mouth.

Her statement was met with a chorus of cheers and whoops.

"Couldn't have said it better myself," said Hylla approvingly.

* * *

Conner wasn't sure what possessed him to run straight at Gaia. Maybe it was that infuriating smile that never wavered even as her army fell to its knees around her and the world began to crumble at her feet.

He yelled battle cry that he kind of hoped would sound menacing but judging by the jeering laughter that followed him, it had sounded more like: "Aaaaggghhh!"

You know: Real heroic and all that jazz.

It came as a surprise to Conner that he actually reached Gaia. It was even more of a shock when Gaia turned to acknowledge him. Conner froze in a kind of shock as he got his first look at her eyes. Black and unearthly.

She was still smiling; lips curved cruelly and pointed teeth edged over them.

Conner felt cheated. He didn't know quite what of, just that he was.

Ironic; that he had pretty much conned and tricked his way about life - and yet here he was - complaining of getting cheated.

"Nice try, hero," said Gaia and Conner didn't have time to wonder how a voice so soft could carry across a war without even a strain, or how someone to purely evil could have such a melodious tone.

Then Conner realised his mental thought-track had just contained the word 'melodious' and he went back to thinking Gaia was pure evil.

That lasted for about a second before Conner was blown from his feet.

It felt a little like wind to begin with, but Conner discovered very quickly that it wasn't. Something to do with the something huge and black that rose from the ground like a wall and smashed into him, sending him freewheeling backwards.

Gaia's face was etched into the back of his eyelids, smiling and her eyes glittering with malice.

* * *

It was often said that Gleeson Hedge was prone to over reacting.

This was the understatement of the century.

He was also vertically challenged but that was not to be mentioned under any circumstances unless one particularly wanted to lose their hearing. And possibly a leg or two.

"You don't mess with nature," he had snapped at Piper when she had asked why he kept talking about aluminium. "Messing with nature means a satyr with a big stick is going to come after you."

This hadn't exactly answered Piper's question per say, but Coach Hedge had been swinging said stick around his head like a lasso and she had let him get back to his previous activities. Read: watching the martial arts channel and shouting "DIE!" really loudly.

"Gleeson," a voice that was strained and desperate. "Gleeson, it's me. Grover."

Gleeson didn't move from where he stood, surveying a scene that was so rancid and terrible to behold he felt his legs melting to butter under him.

"What did they do?" asked Gleeson.

When Grover didn't answer, Gleeson bowed his head and whack his stick – now broken in two – against the bubbling earth. "Tell me, Lord of the Wild; why did all these kids die today?"

Grover shrank back into himself and for a second Gleeson found himself wondering how in Hades this weak, scrawny billy could have been personally blessed by Pan.

"I think," said Grover slowly. "We both know the answer to that question."

"WHY?" yelled Gleeson. A bolt of thunder crashed through the blue of the sky, sending electrical energy pulsing through the air.

"That's right," muttered Gleeson as though this had answered his question. "Because you said so."

* * *

Nico's palms were sweaty and bleeding. He hung onto the rock face like a barnacle facing the storm.

Hair fell into his eyes, he wanted to brush it away but if he let go of his holds or even loosened his grip. Nico gulped and looked down.

Mistake. Nico was deathly afraid of heights. And water for that matter, but he wasn't facing a pond, just a drop so ultimate and steep that he could hear only silence, so loud in his ears that it sounded like screaming.

"Hold on, Nico," he muttered. He looked up and for the first time in too long saw a gleam of light, shimmering through the blackness. A ray of hope in his dark world.

Tugging at his sword with his teeth, Nico dislodged it from the rock and balanced it precariously against his nose. This was the tricky bit. The bit that always made his heart jump and skip over several, probably vital, beats and his blood sing in his ears.

And still, shaking the fatigue, Nico heaved his tired, lagging body upwards and forced the blade of his sword into the rock, piercing through the first cracked layer of stone with ease before meeting the tough stuff. Nico focused his energy into softening the rock, but Hazel had always been the better of the two with their geokinetic abilities.

Nico blinked, and the deafening silence was broken.

It was a small noise of a _schickt_-like quality and Nico was struck by how alien it seemed to him. Suddenly incredibly alert, Nico looked for the source.

He could see none, not a big surprise because he could barely see his own hands from the jagged cliff-face.

_Crack_, Nico's breathing quickened and then he felt his sword move slightly down.

"No," he said desperately as if his very words could stop the inevitable. "No."

The wall crumbled to pieces and Nico, screaming fell back, still clutching his sword tight to him – the last time he had fallen anywhere weaponless was Tartarus and he was not ever doing that again.

Nico could feel the air rushing past him, even though he could not see himself falling; nor where he was going to end up. He knew though. Only one place could be so dark.

For once, Nico thought, it would be nice to just sit somewhere quiet and watch the sun set. Or rise. He didn't really care about the small details, just that it would be warm and safe and light.

Gravel and small stones collided with Nico, more proof that the entire well was falling with him and no doubt leaving hundreds of scars and bruises all over his pale to the point of ghostly skin.

He was still screaming; Nico realised suddenly. A part of him wanted to stop, but a bigger part, whose fear of height was only rivalled by Thalia's, told him in no uncertain terms that if he tried, he would wet himself instead.

It was one thing to try and be a hero, wetting one's own pants was not.

"Hello, Nico," a silky soft voice echoed around him. All saccharine sweet and gooey. Nico didn't trust it immediately, he recognized it from somewhere.

He cracked open one eyelid, expecting to see the faint trace of light flying away from him. Instead he was looking straight into a face.

Gaia's face. She smiled at him. "Did you like my illusion?"

She was eerily beautiful with eyes that were even darker than his and empty of all emotion except the ones Nico could see staring back at him. His own.

"You've been so brave," murmured Gaia. She reached out to smooth down Nico's windswept hair and Nico felt a soft, warm feeling sweep over him, rather like the comfiest blanket in the world.

Gaia was right, he thought sleepily. He had been brave. Brave. Brave.

"_Sometimes you've got to be more than a hero_," Percy's face swam into Nico's mind, his gaze unsettlingly serious. "_Sometimes you've got to throw everything and anything away and just be brave_."

Percy was brave and Nico longed to be like Percy.

But he didn't want to hear it come from this mouth.

"My pawn," said Gaia, still stroking his hair. "My precious pawn who reached the end of the board and became king of my game. King to my queen."

Nico almost growled that he wasn't in her stupid chess game, but kept his mouth shut and nodded as though still under Gaia's spell.

"But there can only be one winner, my black king," said Gaia with vicious pleasure. "And it has to be me."

Nico shot up and out of the clean white bed he had been lying in. His hand reached for his sword and came away empty.

"Good try," Gaia gave a shrug. "But you were search on arrival. Sorry."

She didn't sound sorry and Nico made a mental vow to _make_ her sorry.

"Serve me," said Nico and a breath of wind, cold as ice and smelling of rotting flesh filled his nostrils. His undead warriors appeared from huge fissures that Nico had cracked through the earthy floor - complete with grass.

Gaia smirked and snapped her fingers. Immediately the wind turned into a hurricane and swept towards her, golden dust filled the air as monsters reformed in disgruntled defeat, bowing to their mistress.

"Your undead army," hissed Gaia her voice held laughter as well as vivacious malignity. "Verses mine. The ultimate zombie battle."

There was an inharmonious rattling noise from behind Nico, punctured by the grating sound of sliding vertebrates.

"I don't think my warriors like the sound of that much," said Nico with a flippant smirk that made him look less emaciated and more like his elder cousins as they flipped off important people left right and centre.

"Come on, Nico," teased Gaia as the unsettling grunts and lunges formed around them. They tested the water, as it were.

"Only if you go first," said Nico with a mocking aristocratic bow.

Gaia gave a delighted giggling that made the hair on the back of Nico's neck stand on end. "Oh, my pleasure," she said.

.

_Fin_


End file.
